Sullivan County to offer early retirement

MONTICELLO — To further cut spending while avoiding layoffs, Sullivan County next week will begin offering a retirement incentive to its employees.

Adam Bosch

MONTICELLO — To further cut spending while avoiding layoffs, Sullivan County next week will begin offering a retirement incentive to its employees.

The incentive program will offer county workers, 55 and older, a $20,000 payout for retiring. The money would be paid in two installments, in two fiscal years.

Jobs that are vacated would be permanently abolished. The program was unanimously approved by lawmakers.

"I've said for awhile that the size of county's work force needs to be reduced, where it can be, through amicable means," County Manager David Fanslau said. "This is the preferred method so that we can avoid the need for any layoff plans."

As county revenue from sales and mortgage taxes lags below projections, and the national economy falls deeper into its lull, Sullivan has been forced to cut spending to avoid a budget deficit. Fanslau hopes some 30 workers will take the incentive, which would save the county between $1 million and $3 million, he said. The county employs roughly 1,200 people.

Some county department heads, who are not permitted to speak with the press, are quietly worried about the program. If too many retirees come from one department, it could stress their overtime budgets, they said. And fewer workers would mean more duties for the employees who remain.

"We're not adverse to the county offering an incentive for retirement," said Lou Setren, business agent for the local Teamsters union. "But what is alarming about this incentive is that they're attritioning the positions so that job functions will have to be picked up by the remaining staff."

Fanslau believes that utilizing technology will remedy that concern. He said the county needs to move beyond old-school paper pushing (it used 750,000 new sheets of paper last year, he said) and harness technology to speed up everyday jobs.

As for what happens if employees don't bite on the incentive program, Fanslau would only say, "We'll see where it goes from there."